Recap last few lessons

I was away Monday, and I am away again. Laura fixed our broken arm. She reinforced it and it looked really good. She also drilled the holes for the wheels to go and made the base more sturdy.

So Tuesday I glued the wheels on and made a release system for our trebuchet. I used two nails and two elastic bands. it became quite a effective way to release the arm, though it may not me the safest way. 

Trigger system (2 nails and rubber bands)

Ready to launch

 Mr Ward also helped us a little bit that day. Here is a picture of him being the awesome teacher he is.

Since I am away today as well sick hopefully Laura has fixed any problems that arose during testing and she has gathered some information for the theory part of our assignment. I hope she has. 

SPRAY CAN

Thinking of spray painting our trebuchet in camo colors - harcore weapon of destruction!

And a not so great lesson

This lesson was alright. We made the arm look a bit better and it held the weight which was good. I was afraid that it was going to brake as soon as I put any weight on it. So that was a big relief. But the end of our arm broke, the cup and stuff snapped off. But it was kinda a good thing since I wanted to remake that part anyway so it wasn't really a inconvenience for us. We also made the wheels but when haven't put the on yet, Laura was securing the base a bit more so we didn't have time to put the wheels on. I also got a bit of a boo boo. Laura also was burned by the hot glue gun. This lesson was not good for us in terms of not getting hurt hahaha

And we're in full swing...

Laura was away today so I ha to make sure I was very productive and that we would be on track still. I built some of the arm yesterday but majority today. I had problems with the sturdiness of the center with my hole being so large that the wood could snap under a slight bit if weight. So I re-enforced it with 2 pieces if timber. Then my next problem was how the weight would hang off the end? I soon figured that problem out after a few experiments and decided on pulling a thick long nail between 2 pieces of wood for the weight to hang off. So the nail wouldn't come out I hot glued it into place and then secured each end with a small piece if thin timber to cover the homes. I haven't tested it yet so I don't know if it will hold the weight or not. Hopefully it does. A big problem I had today was that one of the support structures broke and fell apart so I had to reassemble that which was frustrating and time consuming. However after all that we don't have much left to do - just put some wheels on it, finish of a trigger system and tidy the thing up. We should be firing away next lesson!!!

ITS COMING ALONG!

So our trebuchet is coming along really well. Today we finished up making the main structural base and started on the swinging arm. We decided to make where the rod goes across different to everyone else's. instead of drilling a hole on either side we decided to get an extra piece of wood to  go over the rod so we didn't have to drill (and it kinda looked cool to me :P ). I started making the arm while Laura finished off the base. I obviously was not thinking or concentrating properly because i glued, nailed and drilled a hole all on the wrong side. So our planned arm didn't really go to plan. I am hoping tomorrow at lunch to re-make the arm better so that it will work. Our current arm looks like would snap at the lightest bit of weight. It will either need reinforcing or to be re-made again. Laura and I are working really well together. We have reached the rest of the group and may have a working trebuchet by the end of the week if were lucky (if we don't that means lunch time work has to be done). I was thinking once it was done we could spray paint it so it looked mean and nasty, the scariest trebuchet ever see. A WEAPON OF DESTRUCTION!  maybe even some spikes or something hahaa :P 

3rd lesson in

So far so good with a catapult. We have got quite far lately and I think we will be able to get on with the actual catapult soon. :)

2nd lesson

Laura spent yesterday without me cutting out wood and stabilizing the base of our trebuchet. Today we glued the side parts of our frame today and nailed it together. Today was very productive and we caught up to the others.